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Author Topic: Reading anything?  (Read 739963 times)
FatFreddysCat
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« Reply #1650 on: July 23, 2015, 12:30:53 PM »

In the middle of:

Punk Rock Blitzkrieg: My Life as a Ramone by Marky Ramone

On deck:

Underneath It All by Traci Lords
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Newt
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« Reply #1651 on: July 23, 2015, 02:25:11 PM »

Just starting The Writer's Journey: Mythic Structure for Writers (3rd ed.)  2007 by Christopher Vogler.  Fully aware that it is more or less the 'cliff notes' for Joseph Campbell's The Hero With a Thousand Faces - which I have already read.  Picked it up as something lighter and looking forward to the promised pop culture references.

Finishing Boris Yeltsin: From Bolshevik to Democrat (1991) by John Morrison.  Morrison was a Mid-Career Fellow of the Russian Research Center at Harvard University when he wrote this and his familiarity with the context really shows.  It has been interesting enough to keep me reading.  Interesting times.

Prior to that read Comes the Comrade (1950) by Alexandra Orme.  By turns comic, alarming and somewhat baffling account of the Soviet 'liberation' of Hungary toward the end of WWII.  She paints quite the picture of cultural differences.  What you can read between the lines is often astounding.  Have to assume it reflects the insanity of wartime life.

And prior to that read "Hammer of the Gods: The Led Zeppelin Saga" (1985) by Stephen Davis.  Davis expended a lot of energy admiring the group and presents them as a bunch of immature boys-next-door who were rich and famous before they grew up as well as being largely misunderstood.  Um...yeah right.  Starts off well enough but runs out of energy/changes tone and seems to rush to a finish so the last 50+ pages just weren't any fun any more.

Read the first two books of The Darksword Trilogy (Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman) before/during that.
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BoyScoutKevin
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« Reply #1652 on: July 28, 2015, 04:04:51 PM »

Ye-es!

Charlie Finch's
The laws of murder
8th in the Charlie Lenox series

Peter May's
The Lewis man
2nd in the Fin McLeod series
both a sequel and a prequel to the 1st in the series

Asa Larsson's
The 2nd deadly sin
an award winner

Stuart Neville's
The final silence

Laura Joh Rowland's
The iris fan
18th in the Sano Ichiro series
After 18 books and 20 years, the authoress is hanging up her pen, as this is her final one in the series


Christopher Fowler's
Bryant and May and the bleeding heart
11th in the Peculiar Crimes Unit series

Next time: a half dozen of the other
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FatFreddysCat
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« Reply #1653 on: July 29, 2015, 07:42:12 AM »

Comic Wars: How Two Tycoons Battled Over the Marvel Comics Empire - and Both Lost! By Dan Raviv
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indianasmith
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« Reply #1654 on: August 01, 2015, 12:22:35 AM »

REAGAN: THE LIFE by H.W. Brands

It's been 11 years since 94 year old President Ronald Reagan passed away.
A conservative icon, a beloved actor, a controversial figure, and a man at once amiable and approachable and utterly unknowable, President Reagan has not been the subject of many serious biographies yet.  But H.W. Brands, UT historian and one of America's finest biographers (his book on Theodore Roosevelt is a favorite of mine) tackles Reagan with honesty, scholarly credibility, and the keen prose and good humor that make his books such a pleasure to read.  He makes a number of comparisons between Reagan and Franklin Roosevelt, and ranks Reagan as the greatest President since Roosevelt.  This book was a great read for me, and I highly recommend it.  Reagan was the first President I ever voted for, and the 80's were the halcyon days of my youth. Reading this book was a trip down memory lane to a simpler America that I loved being a part of.  A must read for anyone who likes Presidential history.
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« Reply #1655 on: August 02, 2015, 12:27:48 PM »

"No Future for You: Salvos from 'The Baffler'" - slightly humorous political essays from the far left; so far more rhetoric than actual analysis
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BoyScoutKevin
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« Reply #1656 on: August 03, 2015, 07:18:22 PM »

Ye-es!

C.B. McKenzie's
Bad country
1st novel
award winner

Jo Bannister's
Perfect sins

M.C. Beaton's
The blood of an Englishman :
an Agatha Raisin mystery
25th in the Agatha Raisin series

Lene Kaaberbol's
Doctor death
translated by Elisabeth Dyssey
in the Madeleine Karno series

Tess Gerritsen's
Rizzoli and Ioles :
Die again :
a novel
in the Rizzoli and Ioles series
Supposedly there's a TV series as well

Laura Lippman's
Hush
in the Tess Monaghan series

Next time: a retro look at Batman
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BoyScoutKevin
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« Reply #1657 on: August 09, 2015, 04:29:45 PM »

Ye-es!

Jeff Parker's
Batman 66

A graphic novel based upon the old TV series.

v.1. 9 stories. 12 villains.

The Riddler (Frank Gorshin)
Catwoman (Julie Newmar)
The Penguin (Burgess Meredith)
Mr. Freeze (Otto Preminger)
Chandel (Liberace)
The Siren (Joan Collins)
The Joker (Cesar Romero)
Egghead (Vincent Price)
The Mad Hatter (David Wayne)
The Clock King (Walter Slezak)
The Sandman (Michael Rennie)
Catwoman (Eartha Kitt)

v.2. 10 stories. 10 villains

with . . .
The Bookworm (Roddy McDowell)
King Tut (Victor Buono)
Queen Olga (Anne Baxter)
Shame (Cliff Robertson)

and with the return of . . .
The Joker (Cesar Romero)
The Riddler (Frank Gorshin)
Mr. Freeze (Otto Preminger)

and in the manner of, but not on the TV show . . .
Cleopatra
Harvey "2 Face" Dent
Zelda the Great

Next time: 6 of 1
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BoyScoutKevin
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« Reply #1658 on: August 18, 2015, 04:26:02 PM »

Ye-es!, but . . .? 6 of 1 to come next time.

I visit the local library, not only to get on a Pac, but . . .?! also to read the magazines available. These are not the only magazines I read, but . . .?! they are a selection of magazines I recently read one day at the local library.

Wired
--for the news of the future

Rolling Stone
--for the political news

People
--for the gossip

Parents Magazine
--for a laugh. for out of the mouths of babes . . .

The New Yorker
--for the cartoons

National Geographic
--for a look at the world beyond the U.S.

Fortune
--for the business news

The Economist
--for the world news

and

Aviation Weekly
--for something different.

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FatFreddysCat
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« Reply #1659 on: August 25, 2015, 08:42:06 AM »

Just finished:
Anti-Rock: The Opposition to Rock N Roll by Linda Martin

Just started:
VJ: The Unplugged Adventures of MTV's First Wave by Nina Blackwood, Mark Goodman, Alan Hunter and Martha Quinn
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« Reply #1660 on: August 26, 2015, 03:50:43 AM »

Normally when I try to read classic novels I get disappointed by them (seriously, how many pages does Jules Vern spend just listing types of fish in 20,000 leagues under the sea, and the same for Herman Melville with whales in Moby Dick), so when I finally got around to reading a copy of Dracula I picked up a few years ago I was expecting to be let down. Got to say, so far its been a lot better than I thought it would be. Only a few chapters in though. Frankenstein is up next.
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BoyScoutKevin
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« Reply #1661 on: September 02, 2015, 04:52:53 PM »

Normally when I try to read classic novels I get disappointed by them (seriously, how many pages does Jules Vern spend just listing types of fish in 20,000 leagues under the sea, and the same for Herman Melville with whales in Moby Dick), so when I finally got around to reading a copy of Dracula I picked up a few years ago I was expecting to be let down. Got to say, so far its been a lot better than I thought it would be. Only a few chapters in though. Frankenstein is up next.

Yeah, I know where you are coming from, having read all 4 novels, and I must say, that while there never, much to my regret, been a film version that has been faithful to any of the four, except for "Dracula," which no film has ever done it justice (IMHO.) I have found most of the films made from the other 3, more enjoyable than their source material, which may be why no film version has ever been fully faithful to the material. I will also say that I found "Dracula" a better read than "Frankenstein."
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« Reply #1662 on: September 02, 2015, 07:08:57 PM »



Received as a gift. It's about the author procrastinating on working on her second screenplay by going around and conducting interviews with people who posted unusual ads in the local "Penny Savers" classifieds.
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BoyScoutKevin
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« Reply #1663 on: September 03, 2015, 03:02:07 PM »

Ye-es!

Sophie Hannah's
The monogram murders :
the new Hercule Poirot mystery
in the manner of Agatha Christie

The story is serviceable, but . . .?! The highlight is a complete bibliography of Christie's books sorted by type, character, and arranged in the order in which they were published. Thus, we have . . .

39 mysteries with Poirot
14 mysteries with Marple
05 mysteries with Tommy and Tuppence
25 mysteries without the above 3 or 4
06 romances as Mary Westmacott
05 collections of her plays and
03 non-fiction books
97 total

Quinrose, story. Iwaki, art
Alice in the Country of Clover :
March Hare
Continuing the adventures of Alice in Wonderland

Richard Castle's
Raging heat
in the Niki Heat series

Charles Todd's
(a mother and son writing duo)
An unwilling accomplice
6th in the Bess Crawford series

Anne Perry's
Blood on the ater
20th in the William Monk series

Lisa Wiehl's
with April Henry
Lethal beauty :
a Mia Quinn mystery
3rd in the Mia Quinn series
with a reading group guide

And now let me continue on the subject of Jules Verne.

1st. He is the only classical French author I enjoy reading. Maybe, because I find classical French literature so obtuse. The only classical literature I find more obtuse is Russian, which defeats me completely.
2nd. I agree that his "20,000 Leagues Under the Sea" is a bad place to begin. Instead, I'd recommend . . .
a. "Around the World in 80 Days." While there have been several film adaptations, I have found none of them to be as enjoyable as the original source material.
b. "Mysterious Island." While the film version has many fans, including some who post here at this board, I have always found the original source material superior to the film.
c. And one I can't find, because I just can't remember the title, but . . .?! Verne writ at least one children's book. About a group of schoolboys, who find themselves without adult supervision, and at drift on a ship in the middle of the ocean, till they come to a desert island, where they run into conflict, not only with a gang of criminals, but . . .?! each other as well.
3rd. People forget what a prolific writer Verne was, and he was prolific. Maybe people forget, because much of his writings have faded into obscurity. Known only to the experts. Which is probably for good reason.
4th. Many of his novels have been made into films. One of the more obscure of his films, but . . .?! One of my favorites is "5 Weeks in a Balloon." Probably because of the cast, which includes . . .

Red Buttons -- Fabian -- Barbara Eden -- Sir Cedric Hardwicke -- Peter Lorre -- Richard Haydn -- Billy Gilbert -- Herbert Marshall -- Mike Mazurki -- Henry Daniell -- Ronald Long -- Hedley Mattingly -- and Vic Tayback.

Based upon the novel of the same title, which, I must admit, I have not read.

Next time: a half dozen of the other. beginning with 2 anthologies back-to-back
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BoyScoutKevin
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« Reply #1664 on: September 13, 2015, 01:29:01 PM »

Y-es!

Otto Penzler, editor
The black lizard big book of locked room mysteries :
the most complete collection of impossible crime stories ever assembled

71 writers. 68 stories. O'er 39 heroes and heroines, including . . .

Albert Campion -- Arsene Lupin
Barnabas Dreth -- Bernie Rhodenbarr
Crooks, Inc.
Dr. Fell -- Dr. Hawthorne -- Dr. Thorndyke -- Don Diavolo
Ellery Queen
Father Brown -- Fidelity Doe
Hercule Poirot
James W. Bailey
Lester Leith
Madame Roiska -- Mme. Koluchy -- Merrivale -- Mr. Tarrant
Nick Velvet -- Norman Heard
Professor Fen
Raphael, MD -- Rolf Le Roux -- Rowland Hearn
Scientific Crime Club -- Senator Banner -- Sherlock Holmes -- Simon Ark -- "Slot Machine" Kelly -- Superintendent Wiles
The Continental Op -- The Great Merlini -- The Infallible Godahl -- The Nameless Detective -- The Saint -- The Thinking Machine -- Trent
Uncle Abner

Besides the subject matter, the anthology lacks a variety of authors. Besides a couple of Aussies and one or two South Africans, all the writers are either Americans or Brits.

On the other hand . . .
the stories range from those written in the 1830s to the last decade of the last century

Next time: 2nd of a half dozen. another anthology



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